Jeri Ryan Biography

Jeri Lynn Ryan (born February 22, 1968) is an American actress known
for playing the shapely Borg Seven of Nine on Star Trek: Voyager and for her
relationship with Jack Ryan.

Biography

Jeri Ryan was born as Jeri Lynn Zimmerman in Munich, Germany to American
parents. She has one younger brother, Mark. Her father was in the United
States Army and raised the family on military bases all over the country
including Kansas, Maryland, Georgia and Texas. Finally, at the age of 11,
her family settled down in Paducah, Kentucky . After Ryan graduated high
school in 1986 as a National Merit Scholar, she attended Northwestern
University, where she was a member of Alpha Phi sorority. While in college,
she enrolled in beauty pageants and swimsuit competitions to pay for
tuition. In 1989, Ryan became Miss Illinois and won the Miss America
swimsuit competition, while coming in fourth for the Miss America title in
1990. Ryan graduated college in 1990. She stands 5 ft 8 in tall.

After college, Jeri Ryan decided to pursue her dream of an acting career.
Her husband encouraged her and even gave her a plane ticket to Los Angeles.
She moved there and made her first acting debut as an extra in Planes,
Trains & Automobiles, but was cut out of the final version. She continued to
act in commercials and eventually TV shows like Melrose Place, Matlock, and
The Sentinel as well as TV movies like Co-Ed Call Girl. Her big break came
when she won a regular role as an extraterrestrial investigator named Juliet
Stuart on the TV show Dark Skies. The show was cancelled after one season,
but the role drew the attention of the science-fiction community.

In 1997, Ryan was cast to play Seven of Nine, a Borg drone freed from the
collective on the science fiction series Star Trek: Voyager. The role drew
her instant fame and her wardrobe made her a s-- symbol among some
science-fiction fans. It also drew criticism from some fans who felt that
character was created to add s--uality to the show, and who felt that a
disproportionate number of episodes that followed her addition to the cast
focused on her character to the exclusion of others. However, her appearance
also coincided with higher ratings and more positive critical reviews of
Voyager, which were partly attributed to better screenwriting and partly due
to her character being both intrinsically interesting and well-acted.

After Voyager ended in 2001, Jeri Ryan joined the cast of Boston Public in
the role of Ronnie Cooke, a frustrated lawyer who quits to become a high
school teacher. The show's producer, David E. Kelley, wrote the role
specifically for her. The show was cancelled in 2004.

Ryan has recently appeared in movies such as Down With Love.

In 1990, while dealing blackjack at a charity event, Ryan met investment
banker and future political candidate Jack Ryan. The couple married in 1991
and had a son, Alex, in 1994. Throughout their marriage, Ryan and her
husband took turns commuting between Los Angeles and Chicago for their
careers, but finally divorced in 1999. Ryan had mentioned in an interview
for Star Trek that the frequent separation between Chicago and Los Angeles
had been difficult for their marriage. The reasons behind their divorce were
kept sealed.

In 2004, details of her divorce proceedings with Jack Ryan were unsealed by
a California judge despite appeals by both parties to keep them sealed,
claiming that the information could be harmful to their son if released. It
was revealed that, six years before, she had accused Ryan of attempting to
coerce her into s--ual acts with him in public, and in adult clubs in New
York, New Orleans, and Paris. This information led Jack Ryan to withdraw his
Republican candidacy for an open United States Senate seat in Illinois. Ryan
had previously enjoyed a strong showing in the polls, and the Republican
party was left without a strong replacement candidate, so the unsealing of
the Ryan's divorce records may have made the difference in enabling Barack
Obama to win the election.

After her marriage ended, Jeri Ryan began a relationship with Star Trek:
Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise executive producer Brannon Braga. Her most
recent TV appearances have been as a recurring character, Charlotte, on the
hit show, The O.C..

In February of 2005, Jeri Ryan announced the opening of her restaurant,
Ortolan. Located on Third Street in Los Angeles, California, the restaurant
serves French food with a modern interpretation. Ryan opened the restaurant
with her boyfriend, Chef Christophe Eme.